Payroll Report .... Unemployment Rate ... Factory Orders ... ISM Non-Manufacturing ... Momentum Trading DOW Stocks & ETFs … Stock Market Analysis ...

"The least productive Congress in decades." — Michael  Ramirez. Political commentary at...
https://michaelramirez.substack.com/p/michael-ramirez-christmas-returns?r=ntzh3&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
 

Final Christmas Quiz: Name the carol about a Homo Sapien of Crystallized Vapor.

“Trade what you see; not what you think.” – The Old Fool, Richard McCranie, trader extraordinaire.
 
“The effort to submit slates of so-called "fake electors" in Michigan — which then-President Donald Trump narrowly lost in 2020 — appears to have been a project of the Trump campaign itself, according to a recent report. On Thursday night, the Detroit News reported on internal emails from the Trump campaign that showed how the former president's top legal advisers like John Eastman, Boris Epshteyn and Kenneth Chesebro (now cooperating in multiple states' fake elector investigations) "directly orchestrated" the effort to steal Electoral College votes from then-candidate Joe Biden.” Story at...
Trump campaign 'directly orchestrated' Mich. fake elector plot to 'maintain power': report (msn.com)
 
PAYROLL REPORT / UNEMPLOYMENT RATE (Yahoo Finance)
“U.S. employers hired more workers than expected in December while raising wages at a solid clip, casting some doubt on financial market expectations that the Federal Reserve would start cutting interest rates in March. Nonfarm payrolls increased by 216,000 jobs last month... The unemployment rate was unchanged at 3.7%.” Story at...
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/healthy-us-december-payrolls-gain-135258694.html
 
FACTORY ORDERS (Yahoo Finance)
“New orders for U.S.-made goods increased more than expected in November amid a surge in demand for civilian aircraft, government data showed on Friday
Factory orders rose 2.6%...” Story at... 
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/us-factory-orders-rebound-november-153910564.html
 
ISM NON-MANUFACTURING PMI (ISM via prnewswire)
"In December, the Services PMI® registered 50.6 percent, 2.1 percentage points lower than November's reading of 52.7 percent... "The services sector had a pullback in the rate of growth in December, attributed to the decrease in the rate of growth for new orders and contraction in employment.” Press release at...
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/services-pmi-at-50-6-december-2023-services-ism-report-on-business-302026587.html
 
MARKET REPORT / ANALYSIS
-Friday the S&P 500 rose about 0.2% to 4697. (Yesterday’s close was 4689, not 4699.)
-VIX dipped about 6% to 13.35. (The Options Crowd isn’t worried about this pullback.
-The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.051%.
 
PULLBACK DATA:
-Drop from Top: 2.1%. 25.4% max (on a closing basis).
-Trading Days since All-Time Top: 504-days. (The top was 3 January 2022.)
The S&P 500 is 7.5% ABOVE its 200-dMA and 3.5% ABOVE its 50-dMA.
*I won’t call the correction over until the S&P 500 makes a new all-time-high; however, the major bear-market bottom of the 25% decline was in the 3600 area and we called a buy on 4 October 2022.
 
MY TRADING POSITIONS:
XLK – Technology ETF (holding since the October 2022 lows).
XLY - Consumer Discretionary ETF. (Holding since the October 2022 lows - I bought more XLY 8/21/23.)
INTC – Added 12/6/2023.
 
BA – Added 12/6/2023.
DWCPF - Dow Jones U.S. Completion Total Stock Market Index. – Added 12/7/2023. This is a large position in my retirement account betting on Small Caps.
 
TODAY’S COMMENT:
I sold SSO and QLD on 18 December based on top indications. That was less than 1% below the top of this recent weakness. That looks ok now, but short-term calls are not my specialty, so it may turn out that staying long would have been the better choice. I didn’t stay long because preserving capital is more important than earning every nickel...and leveraged positions lose money quickly in a declining market.
 
When I got ready to sell XLK (Technology Sector), I noticed that it was at its December support line, so I held off on selling for now. If it falls much further, I’ll sell. (I’ll probably regret this decision.)
 
We look at a summary of indicators on Friday. (These indicators tend to be both long-term and short-term, so they are different than the 20 that I report on daily.) The weekly rundown of indicators slipped a little toward the bear side, but remained bullish this week: now 10-bear and 10-bull.
 
BULL SIGNS
-The 10-dMA percentage of issues advancing on the NYSE (Breadth) is above 50%.
-The 50-dMA percentage of issues advancing on the NYSE (Breadth) is above 50%.
-The 100-dMA percentage of issues advancing on the NYSE (Breadth) is above 50%
-MACD of the percentage of issues advancing on the NYSE (breadth) made a bullish crossover 12 October.
-Long-term new-high/new-low data.
-The short-term, 10-day EMA, Fosback Hi-Low Logic Index.
-Slope of the 40-dMA of New-highs is rising.
-There was a high up-volume day on 21 December canceling the High down-volume day on 20 December. In addition, there were back-to-back, high up-volume days (80%+) on the NYSE 13 & 14 Dec.
-The 5-10-20 Timer System is BUY.
-61% of the 15-ETFs that I track have been up over the last 10-days. (45-55% is neutral.)
 
NEUTRAL
-There have been 4 Distribution Days since the last Follow-thru Day.
 -There has been 1 Statistically-Significant days (big moves in price-volume) in the last 15-days.
-Bollinger Bands.
-Overbought/Oversold Index (Advance/Decline Ratio).
-Sentiment.
-Bollinger Band Squeeze 28 April - expired.
-The 50-dMA percentage of issues advancing on the NYSE (Breadth) has not been below 50%, for more than 3 days in a row.
-On average, the size of up-moves has been larger than the size of down-moves over the last month, but not enough to send a signal.
-Smoothed Buying Pressure minus Selling Pressure.
-VIX indicator.
-The long-term, 50-dEMA, Fosback Hi-Low Logic Index.
-There have been 14 up-days over the last 20 sessions.
-There have been 6 up-days over the last 10 sessions.
-RSI.
-XLI-ETF (Cyclical Industrials) vs the S&P 500.
-The Calm-before-the-Storm/Panic Indicator flashed a top warning signal 15 Sept., but it may well have been a bottom signal. - Expired
-There was a New-high/New-low spread reversal on 4 October (based on std deviation of spread). - Expired
-The S&P 500 is 7.5% above its 200-dMA. (Bear indicator is 12% above the 200-day.)
-There were Hindenburg Omen signals 11 & 12 Sept 2023 – expired. The McClellan Oscillator turned positive.
-2.8% of all issues traded on the NYSE made new, 52-week highs when the S&P 500 made a new all-time-high, 3 January 2022. (There is no bullish signal for this indicator.) This indicated that the advance was too narrow and a correction was likely to be >10%. It proved correct, but is now Expired.
-20 December there was a Bearish Outside Reversal Day, but the S&P 500 closed above the high for 20 December, 4778, on 27 & 28 December so this one is now neutral.
-There was a Zweig Breadth Thrust 3 November. That’s a rare, very-bullish sign, but the McClellan Oscillator turned negative.
 
BEAR SIGNS
-The smoothed advancing volume on the NYSE is falling.
-Issues advancing on the NYSE (Breadth) compared to the S&P 500.
-MACD of S&P 500 price made a bearish crossover 29 Dec.
-My Money Trend indicator.
-Short-term new-high/new-low data.
-The 5-day EMA is below the 10-day EMA, so short-term momentum is bearish.
-The Smart Money (late-day action).
-The graph of the 100-day Count (the 100-day sum of up-days).
-McClellan Oscillator.
-S&P 500 spread vs. Utilities (XLU-ETF).
 
On Monday’s update of the Friday summary of indicators (20 December 2021), 9 days before the top of the current 25% correction, there were 21 bear-signs and zero bull-signs. Now there are 10 bear-signs and 10-Bull. Last week, there were 6 bear-sign and 18 bull-signs.
 
The daily spread of 20 Indicators (Bulls minus Bears) remained -3 (a positive number is bullish; negatives are bearish); the 10-day smoothed sum that smooths the daily fluctuations declined from +44 to +31. (The trend direction is more important than the actual number for the 10-day value.) These numbers sometimes change after I post the blog based on data that comes in late. Most of these 20 indicators are short-term so they tend to bounce around a lot.
 
LONG-TERM INDICATOR: The Long Term NTSM indicator remained HOLD: PRICE, VIX, VOLUME & SENTIMENT are neutral.
 
(One warning: The Long-Term Indicator is not a good top-indicator. It can signal BUY at a top.)
 
(The important major BUY in this indicator was on 21 October 2022, 7-days after the bear-market bottom. For my NTSM overall signal, I suggested that a short-term buying opportunity occurred on 27 September (based on improved market internals on the retest), although without market follow-thru, I was unwilling to call a buy; however, I did close shorts and increased stock holdings. I issued a Buy-Signal on 4 October, 6-days before the final bottom, based on stronger market action that confirmed the market internals signal. The NTSM sell-signal was issued 21 December, 9 sessions before the high of this recent bear market, based on the bearish “Friday Rundown” of indicators.)
 
BOTTOM LINE
I remain bullish. We are in a short-term pullback to the lower trend line. A decline of about 3% more would be perfectly normal.
 
ETF - MOMENTUM ANALYSIS:
TODAY’S RANKING OF 15 ETFs (Ranked Daily)
ETF ranking follows:

The top ranked ETF receives 100%. The rest are then ranked based on their momentum relative to the leading ETF.
*For additional background on the ETF ranking system see NTSM Page at…
http://navigatethestockmarket.blogspot.com/p/exchange-traded-funds-etf-ranking.html
 
DOW STOCKS - TODAY’S MOMENTUM RANKING OF THE DOW 30 STOCKS (Ranked Daily)
DOW 30 momentum ranking follows:

The top ranked Stock receives 100%. The rest are then ranked based on their momentum relative to the leading Stock.
For more details, see NTSM Page at…
https://navigatethestockmarket.blogspot.com/p/a-system-for-trading-dow-30-stocks-my_8.html
 
FRIDAY MARKET INTERNALS (NYSE DATA)

My basket of Market Internals remained HOLD. (My basket of Market Internals is a decent trend-following analysis of current market action, but should not be used alone for short term trading. They are most useful when they diverge from the Index.) 
 

...My current invested position is about 65% stocks, including stock mutual funds and ETFs. I’m usually about 50% invested in stocks. I’m “over invested” now expecting new, all-time highs this year relatively soon. 
 
I trade about 15-20% of the total portfolio using the momentum-based analysis I provide here. When I see a definitive bottom, I add a lot more stocks to the portfolio using an S&P 500 ETF as I did back in October.
 
CHRISTMAS QUIZ: Ans.
"Frosty the Snowman" is a popular Christmas song written by Walter "Jack" Rollins and Steve Nelson, and first recorded by Gene Autry and the Cass County Boys in 1950 and later recorded by Jimmy Durante in that year.” – Wikipedia.